The Last Peak (Book 2): The Darwin Collapse (12 page)

He knew what she was going to say before the words came out.

“Like you said, we can’t stay in this house. It’s only a matter of time before looters or whatever attacked you comes after us. Whether it’s next door or somewhere else, we need to make that move today.”

Dammit. She wasn’t wrong about that either.

“I can’t lose you, Beth.”

“You won’t.”

“How can you know that?”

“How did you know that you’d return to me after your deployment?”

The truth was that he didn’t. He assured her, of course, that it was some unwritten guarantee. But he knew better.

“I just knew that I’d do whatever it took to get back home to you and Theresa.”

She nodded.

Mason sat in the chair next to her. “If you’re going to do this, I need to have an open communication channel with you at all times.”

“Mobile phones haven’t worked for days. Our walkie-talkies are lucky to work more than a mile in the city. I don’t know how we could do that.”

A possibility flickered in Mason’s mind. An old jarhead buddy. He wasn’t a part of The Thundering Third, but Mason didn’t hold it against him. He hadn’t seen him in too long. Before the outbreak, life was too busy. After the outbreak, social calls weren’t high on anybody’s priorities.

But if anyone could help, Corporal Francis Knipplemier could. Juice as he preferred to be called. As much fun as it was to yank his chain about his given name, every knuckle dragger Mason had ever met called him Juice because the guy could perform miracles with anything that had electricity coursing through its veins.
 

Juice could figure it out. If he was still alive.

Mason pedaled the cargo bike south on Pacific Avenue letting the electric assist do most of the work. He’d opted for a slower, but near-silent mode of transportation. This wasn’t a supply run and the Bronco’s engine was like an air siren in the unsettling quiet that blanketed the new world.

It wasn’t that it was silent.

Seagulls screeched and fought with the ravens perched atop bodies in the street picking at decomposing flesh. It struck him in an oddly removed way. The air stank of rotten meat, and then a fresh breeze would sweep through and all he’d smell was the briny scent of the ocean. And then the stink would settle back in and make him regret that last big breath.

The onshore breeze rattled palm tree leaves high above. It caught bits of trash, cartwheeling them across the street to pile up against the curb on the leeward side.

 
Despite the natural sounds, the sounds of city life were unsettlingly absent. The usual hum of cars driving, people talking, and music drifting from store fronts was missing. Few things felt lonelier than being all alone in the middle of the city.

Juice lived over on the Venice Canals in one of the multimillion dollar homes that lined the waterways. He and Linda shared a sparkling modern construction that they designed themselves. Mason’s old 1960s Craftsmen cost half as much and was a quarter as cool. That was west side real estate, before the outbreak. You could spend a million and a half dollars and live in a crap shack within a mile of the ocean. Or you could spend twice that and end up with something ten times nicer.
 

It seemed like a weird bifurcation of the market until you thought more about it. Your average, successful double-income Joe and Sally could pull a million dollar loan no problem in the sloshing easy money environment created by the Federal Reserve. That inflated the market and created an artificial floor above the million dark mark. But Joe and Sally really stretched to make it happen. Whereas if you jumped up to two and a half to three million dollars, Joe and Sally were left behind by the truly wealthy.

The people that didn’t need loans to purchase real estate. The competition at that level of the market was much, much lower. And therefore, those less contested square feet had to work much harder to earn a sale.

It was bullshit propagated by an institution that had done as much to harm the economy as to help it.

Maybe the outbreak did have an upside. Not since the days of Manifest Destiny had west side real estate been so cheap.

Mason didn’t encounter any threats on the way over. The exertion of the trip loosened his muscles and took the edge off the innumerable pain signals coursing through his nervous system.

He headed down a concrete ramp to the canal level below. A row of expensive houses occupied each side of the small canal. A wide sidewalk ran along each side. Small docks with canoes and paddle boats dotted the shore. Just over a week ago, this was one of the hottest neighborhoods on the west side. Now, it was a ghost town without all the tumbleweeds.

Juice’s house was two down on the right. He turned off the electric assist and coasted to a stop in front. What used to be large glass windows were now gaping holes edged in razor shards. A blood red triangle was painted on the exterior wall next to the missing front door. The painted delta symbol reminded him of the story of how the Israelites had painted lamb’s blood above their doors so that death would pass them by.
 

Obviously lamb’s blood and spray paint didn’t offer the same protection.

Mason looked around. All of the surrounding houses were clearly looted. It made sense. When things went to shit, desperate people noticed those with the most. Juice was not the type to go quietly, but maybe the virus had already taken him by the time looters hit his house.
 

Mason hid the bike behind tall bushes that also artfully hid a water meter. Was probably an HOA regulation in this neighborhood. He drew his pistol, inched the slide back to verify a round was chambered—it was—and kept it in the low ready position while listening for clues. The small front yard was covered in a thin layer of decomposed granite and dotted with a variety of drought tolerant plants. It was the kind of yard that people who didn’t like to think about yards had.
 

A flight of ducks glided in from the east. They lined up to the canal and splashed up small wakes skidding to a stop on the surface. He considered taking a shot at one to add to their protein reserves but refrained, knowing the shot would sound like a cannon in the canyon formed by the houses that lined both sides.

A careful step over the lip of a shattered window and he was inside. The place was gutted to the polished concrete floors. The open floor plan design made almost everything on the first floor visible. The expensive stainless steel kitchen appliances were gone.
 

Really?

Did someone think they needed a fancy dishwasher more than anything else while society fell apart around them?

A large, conspicuous hole showed where the fridge used to be. Even the sinks had been ripped out. Was someone building an HGTV dream home with all their stolen plunder? With no power or water service, those anachronisms of modern convenience were nothing more than shiny doorstops.

An elegant span of clear acrylic stairs led up to the bedrooms on the second floor. Mason went upstairs and cleared them one by one. Thankfully, he didn’t find the bodies of Juice and Linda.

CLANG.

“Shit,” someone whispered.
 

The hushed voice came from downstairs. Mason crept downstairs looking down through the steps as he went. The faint sound of an intentionally placed footfall to his left made him pause at the bottom of the stairs. He circled around the steel bannister and saw nothing in the living room, foyer, or kitchen. He hugged the wall on his left side with the Glock up and ready for action. With all of his senses switched on, he inched toward the back of the house. The wall ended and he paused at the corner.

What was around the corner? He remembered a dinner party he’d attended over a year ago. He’d gone looking for Beth when the conversation lulled. She’d been in a bathroom at the end of the hall. There were two more doors along the hall. The one on the right led to the garage. The one on the left had been closed and he didn’t recall ever knowing what was behind it.

Now was as good a time as any to find out.

He backed up from the wall and sliced the arc of the fatal funnel. Nothing. He sliced more of the arc. Still nothing.

SHUCK SHUCK.

The sawed-off barrel of a Remington 870 Tactical shotgun appeared from the yet hidden slice of the pie. “You picked a good day to die, you dumb son of a bitch.”

A cold knot clenched in Mason’s stomach. He stared at the end of the barrel with the tunnel focus of a massive adrenaline dump. Through the crystal clear haze, he suddenly realized that he recognized the voice.

“Juice, you left a few burrs on the muzzle. That’s a shit saw job.”

Juice’s face appeared from around the corner and he broke into a wide grin. “Sarge, I almost blew your goddamn head off!”

Mason swallowed hard and forced the feeling back into his legs. “Yeah, I’m really glad you didn’t, though.”

Juice slapped him hard on the shoulder. “You look like shit, bro!”

He was one to talk. The goatee he’d grown after returning to civilian life had once been a mere curiosity. Now it made him resemble a kung fu master without all the wrinkles.

“Did you know you had a horse’s ass growing out of your chin?”

He stroked it like it was a cat. “This? It’s my pride and joy. Helps me think.”

"It's good to see you’re alive and well," Mason said. "How's Linda?"

The light in Juice’s face sank beneath a cloud. “We're getting by. How is your family?"

"Tough times with no end in sight, but we're together and alive. Considering the state of things, that’s something."

"Right you are, Sarge. Listen, this isn’t the safest place to get caught up. Follow me."

Juice spun on his heel and Mason followed. They walked into the guest bathroom at the end of the hall. Juice closed the door behind Mason and then stopped, waiting for something.

"Why are we hanging out in the bathroom?" Mason asked.

"Have you used this bathroom before?"

"Yeah, I remember wandering back here for relief at that Christmas party two years ago."

"And when you used the bathroom two years ago at the Christmas party, did you notice anything unusual about it?”

“No.”

“How about now?”

Mason looked around. It was a fancy modern design. Flexible water tubes hung out of the wall where the sink had once been. It had been one of those faucets that spilled out like a waterfall into a clear glass sink. Apparently someone’s HGTV home needed it too. Large holes in the wall showed where they'd ripped the anchors out.

"There's no place to wash your hands?"

"Very funny," he said. "Anything else?"

The toilet was still there. Apparently even a fancy crapper wasn't worth the average looter’s time. The shower stall to the left was one of those that had no door and a wall to keep the spray in.

"I give up. Aside from it looking like it cost more than most kitchens, I don't see anything unusual."

"Exactly." Juice turned and reached into the shower stall over to the recessed shelf in the tile wall. His fingers curled up into the overhang searching for something. Mason heard a click and a muffled whirring sound, like gears turning. Juice stepped back and looked at Mason with a broad grin. "Open sesame."

With all that had happened, Mason didn’t think he’d ever be surprised again. He was.

The tiled shower floor lifted. Sixty seconds later and the whole thing had rotated up revealing a set of stairs descending below.

Juice smacked his shoulder. "Didn't expect that, did you?”

"Can't say I did."

"I knew the world would go to shit at some point. So I created this little emergency refuge for Linda and I. Follow me."

“Where is she?”

“Sleeping.”

Mason followed him down the stairs making sure not to bump his head as he cleared the floor, now roof. They entered a large room with a couple of closed doors along the wall to the right. Juice tapped a button next to the stairs and the shower floor above slowly lowered into place. “Very secret agent. Very Juice Bond.”

Juice laughed.

Mason glanced around. Emergency bunker? This was a prepper’s palace. Six columns of heavy metal shelving units contained endless rows of supplies. Enough food, water, toilet paper, batteries, to last years. A long worktable covered with ordered piles of electrical equipment lined the left wall.
 

At the far corner under the worktable sat a row of shiny silver appliances. Dishwasher, front loading washer and dryer. The missing refrigerator was squeezed between the far wall and the end of the work table. The lights on its front panel glowed blue.

“Do those work?”

“Wouldn’t be much of a refuge if they didn’t,” Juice replied.

Mason shook his head. Amazing. Everyone forgot how utterly transformative automation was until it stopped working. Less than a week without power, and Beth was already getting cranky about laundry. He knew he’d be recruited to the task as soon as their bigger projects were finished.

Juice walked over and picked up a crazy looking gizmo on the near end of the table. It had a spider web of wires looping in and out of circuit boards. A soldering gun sat next to it with the tip smoking.

"Was just working on something when I heard you bumbling around upstairs."

"I wasn't bumbling. I don't bumble."

"You bumbled."

Juice held up the device and Mason could tell he was about to launch into an extended explanation of whatever it was supposed to be. That would have to wait for another time.

"Hey bro, sorry to show up without an invitation, but I need your help with something."

Juice delicately set the device back on the worktable, obviously disappointed at not being able to dive into the details of his latest invention. "Anything, Sarge. You know that. I have what you call the life debt with you."

Mason almost groaned. He'd heard Juice say that before. And even more painfully, he’d endured the explanation of the cinematic reference.

"Don't go Star Wars on me now."